Bearing assemblies are well known. An example of a ball bearing assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,664,534 dated May 12, 1987, and issued to the present inventor. The ball bearings within the ball bearing assembly must be lubricated to reduce the friction within the system to a minimum. The open ended guide sleeve of the U.S. Pat. No. 4,664,534 bearing assembly limits how and where the lubrication can be maintained in the system. Typically, the guide sleeve was maintained in a lower die shoe with a seal at the bottom thereby providing a reservoir for lubricating fluid, such as oil, to lubricate the ball bearings. In such a configuration, there were limitations on the amount of lubrication provided to the ball bearing cage. In the typical configuration, the lubricating fluid reservoir was only at the bottom of the guide sleeve. Therefore, the top portion of the ball bearing cage, which engages the guide post more often than the lower portion, did not receive optimal lubrication throughout its stroke.
Further, the open ended guide sleeve reservoir requires a spatial orientation including horizontal die shoes with the guide sleeve set vertically within the lower shoe. Any other orientation would result in the lubricating fluid leaking out of the reservoir, defeating the intended purpose and potentially interfering with the die casting, stamping or injection molding. Additionally, any debris or dirt in the system potentially could collect on the ball bearing assembly or the guide post thereby causing additional friction and wear leading to untimely loss of precision of the tooling and accuracy in the manufactured component.
Previously with guide post, guide sleeve and ball bearing assemblies there was not known any means for positively assuring an adequate lubrication of the ball bearing cage and maintaining a relatively dirt free environment for the ball bearings to act upon the guide post within the guide sleeve.